


Wait for me, I'm here love

by thesnowyswan



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: 4 Years Later, M/M, POV Robert, Porn With Mild Plot, affair 2.0, as well as ross/vic (for the plot), very basic background aaron/alex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 06:57:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13289490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesnowyswan/pseuds/thesnowyswan
Summary: He leavesBut also how Robert comes home, four years later.





	Wait for me, I'm here love

He leaves.

Aaron is happy and ensconced in a new life and Robert’s world is blown apart, so he just…leaves. Not before everything blows to hell, of course, but he packs himself up and he leaves the pain, the misery ~~thelove~~ behind.

Vic rings him when he’s in the car on his way out, “Are you sure? You could stay, make a go of it?”

“With what, Vic? I’ve got nothing.”

She’s crying because she’s lost so much already, “You’ve got me.”

“I’m always gonna have you, and you’re always gonna have me, but—” He breathes, “I need to take stock. Rebuild.”

There’s coldness in him now, a necessity to deal with the forever growing capacity of drama he has had to deal with.

“You’ll come home?”

He nods, and he realises she can’t see him, “I’ll come home. One day.”

 

 

 

It’s four years before he ever sets foot back in Emmerdale. It’s Vic’s second wedding day, to Ross Barton, of all things. Ross has even been down to visit him with Vic a couple of times, contrite as you like, and Robert takes great pains to make it as awful as he can for him. Out of sight of Vic, of course.

He’s learned that happiness, however it comes, is rare and he won’t take that from her just because Ross tried to kill him and it’s like he’s constantly pissing in Robert’s cheerios with his whole personality.

So, he’s back and he’s giving her away, a letter from Andy in his pocket for her so that she has both her brothers on her big day. You could say Robert is a changed man.

“Robert!” Victoria is glowing and it’s not even just about him being there, there’s the tiny swell to her stomach that no one will think to look for unless she tells them. Another reason why he tolerates her choice of groom.

Robert scoops her up in a hug until her feet hang off the floor, and he can feel his little niece or nephew against him when he squeezes her. “Vic.”

“Put me down, we’ve got your room sorted, well, the nursery—”

“Don’t worry about it, I’m gonna stay in a hotel.” Robert smiles and she looks at him like he’s mad.

“You’re family—”

“And you’re having one, I’m fine. I can deal with the kitsch for a few nights.” He kisses the top of her head. “I just wanted to give you this before I settled in.”

He offers her Andy’s letter and her eyes well up when she sees his handwriting.

“Have a read of that and we’ll go to the pub later, alright.” He kisses her forehead and pinches her shoulder with his hand as she loses herself in thought.

 

 

 

He says kitsch, but he’s managed to get a room at a place a bit further from the village and it’s all clean lines. It reminds him of his flat, the stainless steel of it all.

Robert flops onto the bed and sleeps. He’s got to conserve his strength for the rehearsal dinner.

 

 

 

 

No, it’s just as bad as he thinks. He’s got a migraine right up until Vic nudges him.

“So, you’ll stand there with Aaron.”

“What?” He looks at her. She isn’t having bridesmaids, she’s got Robert and…Aaron standing up for her.

“My two best friends.”

His heart gives a little skip at the thought of Aaron. He just nods dumbly, “Alright, if it’s what you want,”

“I’m still not walking arm in arm with Pete outta this.”

Vic laughs, “No. It’ll be single file out. I know Ross wanted more traditional, but you and Aaron are the ones who’ve been there for me.”

“How is he?” Robert walks behind Vic on the makeshift aisle. It’s a summer wedding so they’re having it outside and then a marquee after. It’s quite atmospheric as it backs off down a hill into some nice woodland.

“Good, still with Alex. A bit boring compared to you.” A dig at the fact Robert has dated. A lot. He’s not even particularly fussy, he just hasn’t found that _thing_ that makes a relationship work. “They’ve got an annual work do which is why they’re not here tonight. You’ll have to impart all your wisdom before you see Aaron tomorrow.”

See Aaron? Sounds like a mammoth task.

“You gonna be alright with that?” She asks him with a touch of speculation.

He shrugs, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Aaron _is_ your ex-husband.”

“Ex. Past tense.”

Vic looks at him and he wonders what she’s looking for because when she finds it, she stops looking at him. They get to the end of the altar, “And this is where you give me away.”

“Give you away? Nah, he can borrow you, but you’re a Sugden, through and through.”

Another wide smile and Vic hugs him around his waist, “I’m glad you’re here, Robert.”

“Me too.” _Me too_.

 

 

 

 

Robert gets trapped in a haze of hairspray and he’s asked what he thinks of Vic’s dress for the tenth time and all he knows is that it’s floofy enough that you can’t tell she’s pregnant.

“Do you think there will be enough space for us both on the aisle?” He mutters under his breath and she pings her garter at him.

“Gross.” He flings it back at her.

“Cheer up you miserable sod, it’s a wedding.” Vic is sipping on bubbly water out of a champagne glass in lieu of actual bubbles, but Robert hasn’t touched it to open it either.

“So, let’s do it, let’s get ya married.” Robert brushes off imaginary lint as someone reapplies three shades of three different nude lipsticks to Vic’s lips.

 

 

 

 

 

His sister looks a vision, her hair all curled up on top of her head, probably a ton of make up to look like she’s got none on, but she’s happy. Really happy, so the sparkly things she’s wearing don’t hold a candle to her.

Robert doesn’t know how he actually manages it, but his first glimpse of Aaron is as he’s walking Vic down the aisle. He’s on the left, waiting, and Robert feels an ache for his wedding, or his attempt at it, when Aaron had stood on the left, expectant – for the three seconds they were there before Faith bolted from the coppers.

He takes him in, he’s thirty now, but honestly, it doesn’t look like time has touched him. Still the same crinkles around his eyes, thick curly dark hair – he does a quick inspection for greys on his temples, nothing. He’s still just Aaron.

 _He’s never just anything_.

Aaron’s smiling at Vic, all soft and unaware of himself. Robert can’t get enough, he’ll never have had his fill.  

Vic reaches out for Aaron’s hand and they give each other a little squeeze before he kisses her cheek. They share a nod as Robert takes his place next to him. The distance is small, but it feels like continents.

The silence is filled with tiny conversations: _Alright? Alright. How are ya? Good. Good_.

Robert manages to get through the service without a contrary word and Ross even gets points for tearing up when Vic spoke her vows. She is once again pronounced Mrs Barton and they follow them to the grassy bit at the start of the aisle for a photo and Robert is suddenly tired.

A hand touches his back, “Come on, one more.”

Aaron.

He’s smiling at Robert. Robert stirs himself enough to smile back, Vic grabs them both for a photo of just three of them, and the photo is just that: Vic trying to grab both their arms as they’re turned into each other in what looks like an intimate conversation. It’s a beautiful photo when the photographer shows them, and Vic demands that they keep it.

“I like natural ones. Helps to remember the day properly.”

Robert can’t help but wish his face didn’t look like it always does when he looks at Aaron. In love.

 

 

 

 

 

Day turns to night, and the fairy lights coupled with the tiki torches flare to light the way. Robert finds himself on a bench near the edge of the forestry with his sole glass of champagne. It’s warm and half drunk so he puts it on the grass. He notices Aaron is walking over to him when he looks up. He’s dishevelled from the festivities, his shirt starting to untuck from his trousers and trying to escape from under his waistcoat.

Robert licks his lips, and Aaron downs his glass and chucks the glass off. Robert raises an eyebrow.

“You decided yet?”

“About what?” He feigns ignorance.

“Coming home.”

_He’s in a hotel bar in Manchester a month ago when he catches sight of a familiar face, “Aaron?”_

_“Robert?”_

_It’s a cold beer and chatter about nothing._

_It’s Aaron patting his hand as he goes to leave, Robert trapping his hand with his thumb._

_It’s a look that says everything._

_He shoves Aaron down on the bed and crawls up over him, pressing kisses against his chest over his jumper, sucking on his neck, dragging his own mouth on his beard. Aaron’s hands wrest his shirt from his jeans and Robert grabs his wrists to pin them above his head._

_“God, Aaron…”_ I love you, I’ve always loved you.

 _Aaron leans up as much as he can for a kiss, but he doesn’t quite reach, his eyes flicking up to Robert’s. Robert lets Aaron’s wrists go and he stays where he is, watching Robert unbutton his shirt enough so that he can pull it over his head. Robert slides Aaron’s jumper up to his neck, fingers brushing as he goes, and Aaron’s hips curve, his belly caves and Robert presses himself down further on him. He’s not going anywhere, even if Robert wasn’t on top of him_.

_He slides down, forcing Aaron’s legs apart so that he can lie between them, Aaron pulls his jumper up over his head as Robert unbuttons his jeans. There’s hesitancy in him; what if Aaron doesn’t actually want to do this? What if he regrets it? Aaron sees him falter and unzips his jeans, shoving them down as much as he can, but barely getting them off his hipbones as Robert is in the way. Gentle fingers run the line of Robert’s jaw and trap his chin between an index finger and thumb, tilting his head up._

“Robert.”

 _It cracks something inside him to hear that. He hears it in his dreams, the way Aaron could fill up one word with all his wants and desires. How_ Robert _could be all of them_.

_He takes it for what it is, he sits himself up again, folding Aaron up so that he can get his hands under his arse and pull his jeans up and off, his legs flailing a bit in the air with how rough Robert is being. He laughs, but his dick is hard, so Robert doesn’t think he finds it entirely amusing. He leaves Aaron to tent the fabric of his underwear, rubbing his hand over his own erection, while he tends to his own pressing against his zip. He unbuckles his belt to slide it out and off. Aaron keeps touching himself as he watches Robert free himself, trousers still on, but pulling his cock to rest up against his skin._

_He leans over Aaron, and because of how they are, his legs hook over Robert’s elbows and get forced back on himself so that they’re almost by his chest as Robert takes a kiss from him. He forces his tongue inside with the minimum amount of resistance as Aaron welcomes him, bites him before soothing the hurt. His hands pull on Robert’s hair as Robert slides his hand from one leg to inside Aaron’s pants. He thumbs at the head and swallows his moans while he keeps his hand low to stop the buck of Aaron’s hips. He takes his hand out, spits on it and slips it back to stroke him harder, dragging him up so that he’s resting outside of his underwear too._

_Robert breaks their kiss to get off the bed, get his wallet out for a condom and lube, basics he keeps inside and kicks his trousers and pants completely off. Aaron pulls his legs up to get his off and drops them over the edge of the bed._

_In some ways, it feels like this is how it’s always been. Them in a hotel room they shouldn’t be in, doing things they shouldn’t be doing. There’s no ring on Aaron’s finger or one on his own, but he didn’t ask. He didn’t care. He just wanted Aaron. His greatest downfall; that he cannot let this man go._

_Aaron sits up on his elbows, his head tilting expectantly._

_No, it’s not the same. There’s never been this cavernous space inside him before. This part of him that just sings Aaron the whole time he lives and breathes. It did when they were together, but it just got wider, chipped deeper the longer he spent away, none of Aaron himself to pour into it like cement to hold Robert together._

_Robert grabs Aaron’s ankles and drags him down the bed. His eyes are a lit fire as his hands press low on Robert’s stomach, but Robert leans back and then down to take the head of his dick in his mouth. Its hot and pulsing and Robert feels Aaron’s thighs almost knock his ears, but Aaron must stop himself._

_He slides off with a pop and tells him, “Just let go.”_

_If they’re gonna do it, might as well fuck it all to hell. After that, he takes him back inside, wets him with spit and Aaron’s thighs are tight against his cheeks, his fingers twisting in his hair. He works him fast, just enough to make sure he’s completely hard before he taps him on the hip to turn over. And he goes. Even after four years, there is nowhere that Aaron doesn’t trust Robert to take him._

_He rips open the lube and drizzles it down on him, and he gets cursed out for the cold and he spreads it with warm fingers in apology. He leans down and presses a kiss on Aaron’s back, takes his hand when he reaches it back, folding down onto his shoulder against the bed as Robert works his fingers slowly inside him._

_It’s heat and it’s pressure and he can’t help but rock his own hips in anticipation, letting his tongue swipe at Aaron’s skin as he sighs and draws himself on and off Robert’s fingers in minute thrusts. He slides down and out and uses the last of the lube to slick himself up after he rolls the condom down._

_Aaron has turned back over, his hand moving on himself again, lip bitten between his teeth as he holds one leg up. Robert puts his hand over Aaron’s so they’re both holding him up, and he runs his other hand down Aaron’s belly, over the inside of his thigh, watching as he comes up in gooseflesh. In a lot of ways, Aaron is the most Aaron like this. Stripped down and bare in more than just his physical nakedness. He gives up things; looks, sounds, absent touches to himself that he’d never do outside of this. Only here does he let himself go and gives himself what he wants._

_Robert rests his left knee on the bed, knocking Aaron’s other leg up over his thigh as he lines himself up. Aaron lets go of his dick and grabs Robert’s forearm as he eases inside. He hasn’t done this in so long. Sex, yes, but_ this _. Leaning down to kiss Aaron, his hands pulling at Robert’s shoulders, shared breaths as they part, he hasn’t done that in years_.

_He holds himself up on his hands as he rolls down and up, Aaron wincing a little as he arches his back._

_“Okay?” He asks him, and Aaron nods, sliding his leg up towards Robert’s shoulder._

_There’s nothing stopping him now, his body just pressing and drawing back to and from that heat. He closes his eyes and it could almost be five, six years ago. Back when they were happy, giddy boyfriends who took afternoons to fuck in their bedroom at the pub. No, it’s further back. The first few times after they got back together after everything. Slow, measured and designed to rebuild. To instil a trust that had been broken._

_“Robert.”_

_He opens his eyes, Aaron’s skating his fingers down Robert’s chest, dragging tingles in his wake. His chin is tilted up, tongue swiping to wet his lips. It’s a dare, it’s all a fucking dare, and Robert answers it. He holds himself aloft further down, arms by Aaron’s hips and he shoves his own hips forwards, Aaron rocking and crying out with it. He’s barely able to scramble to hold Robert’s shoulder, letting his leg drop, but Robert keeps going. Keeps dragging Aaron’s hips down when he leans back and watching as Aaron’s grip slides off completely, until all he’s got left is the duvet to curl his hands up in. He’s choking out moans as he tilts his head right back, the line of his throat exposed, and Robert can see him swallow around every sound he makes. He realises_ he’s _grunting too, his body responding to everything Aaron does, every twitch and constriction of his body pulling something out of Robert._

_Aaron manages to push at his hands before he pulls Robert down, chest to chest. They don’t kiss, more like openly slide their mouths together as Robert keeps their bodies moving. He rubs his hand over Aaron’s dick, up under the head like he’s always loved and lets his own body go when Aaron tenses up and spills on his own belly. Aaron’s shuddering and Robert can barely hold himself together. He’s shattered into a million pieces, broken a hundred different ways, but still put back together by Aaron’s gentle hand rubbing the back of his head as he tucks himself into the nook between his neck and shoulder. He feels Aaron kiss his cheek where he can reach him, and he lifts his head up._

_He nods because no words will come out, Aaron strokes his hair again, nodding back at him. Aaron also rubs their noses together before he gives Robert a shaky kiss on the mouth._

_Robert peels himself off and out of Aaron and gets him a warm flannel as he sits on the end of the bed, rumpled by their sex._

_“It’s always gonna be you, ain’t it?” Aaron looks up at him as he takes the cloth and wipes himself. He isn’t sad, he isn’t happy, he’s just resigned._

_Robert wants to lie and say no. It’s always going to be Aaron for him too, even though they know better. Even though they tried and failed._

_“You ain’t even gonna come home, are you?”_

_He knows what Aaron is implying._ You’ve had me and now you’re gonna fuck off.

 _“Emmerdale isn’t home.”_ Without you.

_“Of course it is, you’re just a coward.” Aaron grabs his pants and pulls them on. “S’why you left without saying goodbye. You did it years ago and you did it then.”_

_Robert feels his anger spike, “I lost everything I ever loved, and what? You wanted me to stay and watch? Watch someone else love the man I—”_

_He stops himself._

_“I didn’t owe you anything.”_

_“You owed me everything, Robert. That’s why you did it.” Aaron yanks his jeans up next. “You didn’t want to stand and face what I had to say.”_

_Robert starts picking up his own clothes, “And what’s that, hmm? I can’t, I shouldn’t, I won’t?”_

_“Stay, you fucking idiot.”_

_He pulls his pants on and folds his arms, “For what?”_

_“Guess we’ll never know.” Aaron shrugs his jumper back on and his phone goes. He’s tapping away as Robert redresses himself._

_“In the spirit of honesty…”_

_Robert feels the knife that Aaron’s already jabbing in._

_“That was Alex. We’re still together.”_

_He doesn’t know if his mouth drops, but he feels like it should, “Then_ why? _”_

_“I guess I couldn’t let ya go.” Aaron walks up to him, cups his cheek and pulls him down to kiss the corner of his mouth softly. “Bye, Robert.”_

_The concerning thing is that it doesn’t even sound like goodbye at all._

 

 

 

 

 

“How’s your husband?” Robert asks as Aaron sits down.

“Dunno, don’t have one now.”

He side-eyes him because he doesn’t understand, Aaron elaborates though, “We ain’t married.”

_After four years?_

“I thought that’s what you wanted.” He picks up his drink and takes a gulp finally.

“It’s what I wanted when I was with you.”

Aaron didn’t come to mess around then. Robert slides so that he’s facing sideways and Aaron’s profile flickers with the firelight.

“What are you doing, Aaron, you have a boyfriend.”

Aaron keeps facing forward as he talks, “You remember when I said I’d have to try with someone, anyone, just not you.”

He nods, he remembers how it ripped his still beating heart out to hear Aaron deny _him_ the way he did.

“I didn’t think it’d be forever, Rob.”

 _What?_ “What?”

Aaron looks at him with shining eyes and Robert almost reaches out to grip his knee.

“You were supposed to come back, you were supposed to get fixed and come back.”

What he said to Vic when he left: take stock, _rebuild_.

 _Aaron_ has been waiting all this time.

“You never rang.” Robert feels like his insides have been twisted to be outside his body, “You never once got in touch.”

“After everything you’d lost?” _Sebastian_. Aaron was never gonna ask him to stay for himself but hoped that Robert would want to, for Robert, and that if he had stayed long enough, they’d to fall back together.

“Robert, the village is yer home whatever, and Vic’s, she’s having a baby now and she’s gonna need ya, so come home.” Aaron rubs at his face and stands, turning away.

“No,” Robert tells him, and Aaron looks back at him. “You ask me.”

“Robert…”

He stands up, steps forward until he’s almost touching the line of Aaron’s back with his chest, leaning forward until his nose almost touches his cheek, “You want me, tell me.”

There’s heavy silence so Robert pushes again, “Tell me, Aaron. Tell me you want me to come home. I’ll do it, for you.”

He sighs and it’s like the last 4 years have been lifted from his shoulders, “Come home, Robert.”

Robert kisses his neck, above his collar, willfully ignorant of the other guests.

“I miss ya.”

He nudges Aaron’s cheek when he turns his head, lips grazing down to the corner.

“I want ya back,”

That gets Robert’s attention, but Aaron qualifies it with, “in the village.”

He drags his mouth over Aaron’s lips, kissing him forcefully, pulling his body round, his hands moving down to draw him in by his waist, to press him close with hands between his shoulder blades.

He also lets him go because they can’t. They’ve done _this_ too many times before for them not to know better. Aaron leans his forehead against Robert’s chin where he’s looking up.

“Leave him and we’ll talk,” Robert mutters in the dark. Aaron nods and leaves him there at the bottom of a hill on a bench wondering how any of this ever happened.

 

 

 

 

It tops up to a massive fight between Aaron and Alex. Alex, for his part, had known that something had changed in Aaron after their hotel room rendezvous, but didn’t know all the pieces until Robert showed up a month later. They manage to keep that night quiet, just that their feelings had resurfaced, and Aaron wasn’t willing to give them up a second time.

He lies on the bed in Robert’s hotel room where he’s still staying until he finds a place.

“He shouted, I shouted.” Aaron sighs, “S’not like he was surprised.”

Robert can tell Aaron feels horrible about that. Being the one who breaks up a good thing for something else. _Someone_ else.

He lies down and lets Aaron roll on top of him, just spreading himself out over Robert to trap him as he listens to Robert’s heartbeat.

“Why did you stay with him?” He can’t help but ask.

Aaron sighs, “I love him, Robert.”

 _Just not like I love you_.

“I just—always thought it was us. Like you said.” _You and me_. “I guess I never quite let it go.”

Aaron tucks his head down, embarrassed, Robert assumes, and he just rubs his back and gives his side a squeeze.

“I never let you go either.” He admits, “I dated, a lot. I was looking for that ease I had with you, but I was never gonna find it.”

 _‘Cause you’re my perfect fit_.

“There was never?”

Robert takes pride in the incredulity of Aaron’s voice and laughs at it, a thick chuckle that shakes his chest and Aaron finally looks up at him.

“There was someone for a while. Alright, but not you.”

He thinks that sums everything up until now for both of them nicely: alright, but not you. Part of him wants to ask why Aaron didn’t try harder, get married, actually throw himself into Alex with the same reckless abandon as he did Robert, but that’s the point of it. He never gave all of himself to anyone because of Aaron. He always held a piece here and there, so he’d know, if they ever made it back to each other, there were parts of him that no one else but Aaron had ever touched.

“It was always gonna be you.” He mimics back Aaron’s words. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”

Aaron reaches up and gives him a short kiss, a peck, one like he used to before he left the house, “You waited, I waited. It was time.”

 

 

 

 

And they find it was time enough. They don’t fall into the same potholes, the same insecurities, not because they don’t exist, but because they don’t hurt like they did. They also don’t hide them from each other.

When work gets tough for Aaron, Robert feels him pulling away, so he sits him down one night and tells him, “I don’t feel like you need me.”

So, Aaron works harder to include Robert in what’s going on, letting him book date nights that they actually go on, doing spare paperwork that Aaron used to hoard like a shitty paperwork scribbling dragon.

And when Aaron feels like he isn’t enough, Robert sits him down and tells him all the ways he is. Sometimes it’s enough, sometimes it’s Robert booking a fancy restaurant for his own business and introducing him as ‘my husband’ and having people ooh and aah.

It’s reductionist to think of it that way, as those being their only issues, but Robert realises that most things if caught early, can be cut off at the pass. Everything else, the desperate need they had for each other, to cling to the very cracked foundations of their relationship is gone because it doesn’t exist anymore. Now it’s two men; grown, rounded and whole deciding each day to be together.

And while the thought of time lost hurts Robert, deeply, he realises he wouldn’t have had it any other way. He wouldn’t want to be any version less than the one who gives Aaron everything he needs and gains what he needs in return.


End file.
